Bachmann bach-pedals on de-gay-ification

In the wake of revelations that Michele Bachmann and her husband operated a clinic that tried to re-program homosexuals to be straight, some evangelicals claim that they have been quietly backing away from the practice for years. It must be a very quiet operation, because the average, rank-and-file evangelical certainly has not gotten the news. Huge numbers of them still believe in exactly this kind of thing and want to send their children to reprogramming clinics the moment there is a blip on the gaydar.

In fact, according to this article, counsellors at the Bachmann clinic still see it as an illness that can be treated, primarily with prayer, but it's just that they admit, at least according to secretly recorded office visits, that they are not particularly competent at dealing with it.

In the transcripts of the Time.com article, for example, the therapist laughably suggests that a person might become a homosexual by seeing another man take his shirt off at an early age. Well gosh, I think just about 100% of boys have seen at least one other boy without a shirt, and yet the overwhelming majority of these boys never turn out to be homosexuals. I hope that people are not paying good money for this kind of advice.

It's great to hear that some evangelicals, like Southern Baptist Seminary President Albert Mohler can finally admit that, "sexual attraction and a profile of someone’s sexuality is a complex of factors, some of which are certainly not chosen". However, I doubt that the Bachmann's or any other right-wing politicians will run on a clunky slogan like that. Instead they still say you can "pray away the gay".